The Witcher 2 - Preview @ Gamespot

[Korplem]

Gamespot has a three page preview (http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/thewitcher2/news.html?sid=6254071&mode=previews&page=1) of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings.
Though we've seen only a brief demonstration of the sequel in motion, and although much of what we've seen is still very early in development, it's very clear that CD Projekt Red aims to produce a sequel that's far more eye-catching and more engrossing than the original game. At a glance, the new game seems a much better-looking action-role-playing hybrid with a more closely zoomed-in camera view, but it will also offer a revamped combat system, an improved character development system, and many more improvements we'll hear about in the months to come. Given that The Witcher 2 will offer a new experience with more-free-form combat, huge boss battles, and a brand-new, dark, mature fantasy story that continues after the first game left off, there's a lot for role-playing fans to be excited about. The Witcher 2 is currently planned for release in the early part of 2011 for the PC, and although CD Projekt Red is also interested in developing a console version of the game, other versions haven't been confirmed yet.
They also have a four minute video interview (http://www.gamespot.com/news/6254068.html?tag=latestheadlines;title;2) with Tomasz Gop, CD Projekt Red senior producer.
More information. (http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/newsbit?newsbit=14666)

[Dhruin]

Hmm...so companions / followers play a more prominent role. Interesting.

[JDR13]

Hmm…so companions / followers play a more prominent role. Interesting.

Only for the large battles hopefully... I don't want someone following me around for hours at a time. I liked the solo aspect of the first game.

[Damian Mahadevan]

Hopefully there are more ways to finish quests than the original one. Other than the sex cards which i found to be rather condescending(as if i got no access to porn), i found the lack of options in what i could do questwise infuriating. For example that part with the vampires in town and the whore girl, i didnt like the fact that I couldnt kill the guy and get the girl out of the situation and leave it to her if she wants to go back.

[Tragos]

Hell, i so totally hate companions ...

[Francesco]

I don't like companions too... anyway... something got me worried: "the new game seems a much better-looking action-role-playing hybrid " .... action-rpg? Action? The Witchers wasn't an action rpg... it was an rpg period, it would be a little disappointing to see it switching to a more action oriented gameplay.

[20mithrandir]

Hmm…so companions / followers play a more prominent role. Interesting.
Not only interesting but fully in the spirit of the novels. A lot of interesting situations evolve around friends of Geralt (especially Zoltan, Dandelion and Triss) and they give the witcher insights on various themes (by stating their opinions vehemently) he would otherwise have ignored.

Any game with a big amount of fights is called 'Action-Something' nowadays. So most of the RPGs rely on huge amounts of combat and therefore would be categorized as action-oriented nowadays. I don't think Gothic is an action game (especially the original) but it was called Action-RPG ever since.

Personally I'm intrigued by the preview. It seems CD Projekt focused on just the right things (combat system, dialogue, clothing/equipment). Can't wait to see more of the game..

[Dagon]

You will probably want to know that they have finally get rid of those horrible fed ex quests! :)
The C&Cs, Story and Dialogues are the most important aspects for them this time.
It actually seems that they listened to the fans, and changed what they didn't like.
The graphics are around 60% complete (which hopefully means that geralt's face will be changed). There is reputation system, every npc has his name, thoughts and will react to Geralt in different ways based on Player's decisions.
New dialogue system seems to be inspired by Mass Effect & Alpha Protocol, time based choices, If you aren'y quick enough the system will take the default response which isn't the best one for the player

And yes I am hyped! :)

The info comes from polish previews

[Trelow]

I still haven't finished the first one. I've had the dang thing since it released on Steam, and only barely made it past the tutorial/into section.

I think I just don't like Geralt. He's kind of a d-bag.

[DeepO]

Sounds good.
Seems like the game retains the spirit of its predecessor and improvements seem sensible. Personally, I´m all for a bit more prominent role of companions.
I wonder if some choices made in previous game will carry over.
Hopefully those models are only beta though.
Well, I´m buying this no matter what anyway.

Like the previous game, The Witcher 2 will use a "timed dialogue" system
The Witcher I´ve played hadn´t timed dialogues. Gamespot,

[Anderson]

Dagon said:
The C&Cs, Story and Dialogues are the most important aspects for them this time.

Sounds good to me. I hope they give us console boys a decent port.

[you]

I felt the developer really cares about making a quality game so even if there are henchmen I suspect it will be done in an interesting way. Perhaps too much blind faith but still I think we have to give them a lot of credit for how they responded once the game proved a success (compare this to many of the large publisher owned developers).

Now if they could only get away from atari :)

[kalniel]

I felt the developer really cares about making a quality game so even if there are henchmen I suspect it will be done in an interesting way. Perhaps too much blind faith but still I think we have to give them a lot of credit for how they responded once the game proved a success (compare this to many of the large publisher owned developers).

Now if they could only get away from atari :)
They have haven't they? That particular Atari doesn't really exist any more. It's only being distributed by Atari Inc, and that's for NA only as well. Hopefully they'll get western Europe sorted, possibly through NBP (hopefully :D).

Anyway, this was the press release:

—
March 24, 2010 - Warsaw, Poland. Today, CD Projekt RED officially announced The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, the sequel to the award-winning The Witcher, which has sold more than 1.5 million copies worldwide on PC alone.

The second entry in the Witcher saga is characterized by an incredibly gripping, mature and challenging non-linear plot. In addition, the new combat system is even smoother and guarantees a greater variety of tactical possibilities.

The game is built upon completely new technology, designed from scratch by CD Projekt RED to develop role-playing games with non-linear plot. The new technology also delivers beautiful visuals, transporting players to one of the most vivid RPG universes ever.

“I am really glad that we can officially present what we’ve been working on for the past two-and-a-half years.” - said Adam Kiciński, CEO of CD Projekt RED studio. “We learned a lot during The Witcher’s development process, and we are using all of that knowledge to ensure the sequel is one of the best RPGs people have ever played. We’ve concentrated on improving the most successful parts of the Witcher, and I strongly believe that The Witcher 2 will be loved both by fans of the original and newcomers. We know that we aimed very high while producing The WItcher 1. Now we are aiming even higher with The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings.”

The company also announced distribution agreements for various territories, Atari Inc. (North America), 1C-SoftClub/Snowball Studios (Russia) and CD Projekt (Poland and Central Europe); negotiations for Western European distribution are in progress. Moreover, CD Projekt RED signed a contract with Agora S.A., which makes Agora the co-producer of the game in Poland. Thanks to this contract, CD Projekt RED will receive financial and promotional support, and the know-how of one of Poland’s biggest media corporations.

Tomorrow the game will be presented publicly for the first time, during the CD Projekt Spring 2010 conference. The event will be transmitted on www.cdprojekt.pl/konferencje. Additionally, new video materials related to The Witcher 2 will be posted at TheWitcher.com, and on April 7th the brand new official website will be launched.


You can follow The Witcher on Twitter (@WitcherGame) and on Facebook.com/The-Witcher.

—

[Thrasher]

Nice well done presentation. I am intrigued about the improved combat and more involved companions. Timed dialogue responses with little text to choose from? Not interested...

[DeepO]

Hm, after googletranslating this http://gamecorner.pl/gamecorner/1,102651,7694204,Wiedzmin_2___tak_mialo_byc_od_sam ego_poczatku.html
it seems that some decisions carry over if you import the save from the first game.
Also, apparently Geralt can now climb and jump which is way cool.
I rather missed the vertical dimension in the first one.

[Dhruin]

I'd personally characterise it as an action/RPG, alongside Gothic and Vampire: Bloodlines. For me, any RPG that emphasises player-driven, action-based combat is an action/RPG. Most of the best RPGs for years fall into that category, so I wouldn't worry about the label at all.

[JDR13]

Hm, after googletranslating this http://gamecorner.pl/gamecorner/1,102651,7694204,Wiedzmin_2___tak_mialo_byc_od_sam ego_poczatku.html
it seems that some decisions carry over if you import the save from the first game.



That's excellent news indeed... strange that we haven't heard anything about it until now though…

[Zephyr]

...so glad I kept my Saved games.

[JDR13]

…so glad I kept my Saved games.


Damn… I guess I'll just have to replay The Witcher. :)

[Rake]

What the hell did they do to his face? Way too "pretty boy" for my liking.

[xSamhainx]

looks like I better run thru it again in the coming year in preparation!

This time to side w/ the Squirrels tho

[Crolug]

Even CDP stated many times that The Witcher is an Action RPG. But a lot of action doesn't exclude deep story and memorable C&C by default IMO.

BTW I saw many posts disliking Geralt's pony tail, but heck, I like it :)

[JonNik]

There is absolutely no need for them to change anything about Geralt from #1 and I
sincerely hope they do not (especially the voice actor !). Perhaps there is indeed time for
them to change their opinion on the matter further down the path.

I would not make a terrible fuss about it though and signs seem to be good about the
important stuff so far…

I do not like the timed dialogue thing though.

[Phonix]

An little update aboute the "face Gate" :biggrin:

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Blooddragon
Lead Character Artist
CD Projekt RED

It’s understandable that no one likes things they got attached to being changed - that’s a fact, that’s why the new face woke up so many emotions. Let me give you a short clarification though

In case of TW1 Geralt’s face was done, as I remember, 3 times totally from the scrap. It changed a bit every time, which you can see on various promotional materials. Since we started working on TW2, the face has changed another 2 times (the face from the first leaked material, believe it or not, was totally different than the one in TW1). We’re just constantly looking for and complaining

Since the times of TW1 we got experienced and got more skills, we can make more realistic faces which have proper proportion and human features. We also have incredible concept artists whose creations are way better than the ones from TW1. That’s why we decided to redesign all main characters, and once again design their faces, just barely based on the originals (keeping only the most important features - Dandelion’s little beard, Zoltan’s haircut, etc)

Once we had the full set of main characters put together side by side, Geralt started to look strange… his disproportionate face stood out making the impression of badly made model. It pushed us to iterate Geralt one last time, thanks to which the White Wolf got his human proportion, which bizarrely provoked many of your comments

For you, the old Geralt had a face with intentionally highlighted ‘wolfish’ features, for us he was simply a badly made model

Nevertheless, you rightly point out in your comments that Geralt looks too young, has too shallow scars, too few of them and too flat texture - WE’LL FIX THAT! The texture of the face definitely needs to be fixed and will definitely make Geralt look differently. We’ll probably mess with the eyes as well. However, the proportion of the face, its structure will probably stay the same - we won’t come back to the old proportion both for technical reasons (ready facial expression system is done based on this head) as well as for time limitations (each iteration of Geralt’s head takes a lot of time, which is always too short). Moreover, we’re simply happy with the face which you could see on the main page of GameTrailers:



In your comments you focus mainly on the last shot from the film, in which Geralt’s face is in strange grimace. Let me point out that those shots were not prepared especially for the film, they are part of the game, they were recorded and used in the film which you will have the chance to check on Thursday.

Regarding the rest of the model:

Geralt’s hair in the film and current gameplay has no physics applied (the hair is still), has no shader (which will diametrically change the look) and is taken from the first leaked material (June 2009) - we plan to make it from scratch. Additionally, there might be a possibility of changing the haircut by the player, I’m totally in favour of that.

On the film Geralt is wearing a heavy armour - that’s why he’s looking powerful and heavy, in TW2 the character will have much more equipment elements and armours. There will be light armours - just like the first three in TW1 - and heavy ones like the one from the film. Scabbards are not fully done yet, that’s why they split while sword is being taken out - that will be fixed. We also have a sabre with curved scabbard, already done. Maybe it will be presented on Thursday as it looks super cool

Well, it took me a while but I hope I dispelled a few of your worries. I’m sorry I won’t answer your specific questions but you created loads of them

Keep tight and thanks for your support!
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